ITOH Josei
Vice Chairman
Keidanren
The answer is that Japan's current social system, formed during the 50 years since the end of the war while the country was in the process of catching up with the advanced nations of Europe and North America, must be converted into a creative social system; one in which each element of society brings its own originality into full play. One specific strategy for achieving such change is deregulation.
In promoting deregulation, we should keep in mind one indispensable premise; All of society's "actors" - the government, business and individuals - must free themselves from the framework of co-dependency that characterized the past, each must establish its own principle of self-accountability under which it chooses its actions on its own and is solely responsible for those actions and their consequences. This fostering of self-accountability will help restore dynamism to the economy and, in the long run, will revitalize society.
Of course a society predicated on self-accountability will be a society that rewards individuals for the work they do. Businesses should no longer rely on the protection by the government, as they have had in the past. Rather, each business will be subject to the perils of "survival of the fittest" and, in this new atmosphere of Darwinian economics, it will be forced to meet the competitive challenge posed by newcomers. Each individual, too, will be forced to revise his or her old notions, by which individuals left to government and business the responsibility for making choices. Additionally, the government will be asked to buckle down to the task of making public the information necessary for holding enterprises and individuals accountable for their choices and actions. That is to say, truly effective deregulation will be possible only after each principal fully recognizes and accepts these austere realities. Without this, one cannot hope to achieve the shift to a new social system.
In these "countdown" days heading into the 21st century, it is necessary for the government, businesses, and individuals to prepare themselves for the new era by once again reflecting on the full meaning of self-accountability. Each must do what can be done to promote such change in the social system.